Cohen c08.tex V2 - 07192013 940pm Page 2358Developm.docx

Cohen c08.tex V2 - 07/19/2013 9:40pm Page 235
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Developmental Education
Enhancing Literacy and Basic Skills
Nothing has been easier to decry than the ineffectiveness ofthe
schools. One observer of American education noted:
Paradoxical as it may seem, the diffusion of education
and intelligence is at present acting against the free
development of the highest education and intelligence.
Many have hoped and still hope that by giving a partial
teaching to great numbers of persons, a stimulus would
be applied to the best minds among them, and a thirst for
knowledge awakened that would lead to high results; but
thus far these results have not equaled the expectation.
There has been a vast expenditure . . . for educational
purposes . . . but the system of competitive cram-
ming in our schools has not borne fruits on which we
have much cause to congratulate ourselves. (Parkman,
1869, p. 560)
The sentiments in this passage, written in 1869 by the American
historian Francis Parkman, have been echoed countless times
since.
One hundred years after Parkman’s comment, the American poet
and critic John Ciardi complained that “the American school
system has dedicated itself to universal subliteracy” (1971, p.
48).
The novelist Walker Percy offered this devastating critique:
“Ours

is the only civilization in history which has enshrined
mediocrity
as its national ideal” (1980, p. 177).
235
Cohen, Arthur M., et al. The American Community College,
John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated, 2013. ProQuest Ebook
Central,
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236 THE AMERICAN COMMUNITY COLLEGE
A steady outpouring of books continued the critique. Hirsch
began his best seller with the words, “The standard of literacy
required by modern society has been rising throughout the
devel-
oped world, but American literacy rates have not risen to meet
this standard” (1987, p. 1). Harman’s examination of illiteracy
described how “more and more working members of mainstream
America are found to be either totally illiterate or unable to
read
at the level presumably required by their job or their position in
society” (1987, p. 1).
The conventional belief was that literacy had declined. But how
much? And by what measurement? Certainly the colleges were
and
are deeply involved with developmental studies, but at what
cost to
their image? And to what effect? In this chapter, several
dilemmas
surrounding the tracking of students into less-than-college-level
courses are explored, especially the difficulty in assigning
standards
and definitions and assessing program outcomes. Some
examples
of the ameliorative practices in which the colleges are engaged
are
also noted.

Decline in Literacy
Unmitigated denunciations are one thing; accurate data are quite
another. Information on the literacy of the American population
over the decades is difficult to compile, even though for well
over
one hundred years the Bureau of the Census has collected data
on the number of people completing so many years of
schooling.
Intergenerational comparisons are imprecise because different
per-
centages of the population have gone to school at different
periods
in the nation’s history and because the United States has never
had
a uniform system of educational evaluation. Still, an
understanding
of the importance of literacy, concern about its decline, and the
need to do something about it have become widespread.
Eight National Education Goals were set into law on March
31, 1994, when President Clinton signed the Goals 2000:
Educate
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Developmental Education 237
America Act. One of the eight goals was that every adult would
be literate, possessing the knowledge and skills to compete in
the workplace and exercising the responsibilities of citizenship.
Although the act itself has been superseded, its emphasis on
stan-
dards, norms, and instrumentation so that measures of literacy
in all age groups could be reported according to common refer-
ents has survived, incorporated into the contemporary emphasis
on accountability. Subsequent federal legislation has
emphasized

testing students periodically, with the intention of encouraging
schools where students score below the norm to improve.
Concerns about literacy came as no surprise to educators who
have reviewed the scores made on nationally normed tests taken
by people planning on entering college. The available evidence
suggests that the academic achievement of students in schools
and colleges registered a gradual improvement between 1900
and
the mid-1950s, an accelerated improvement between the mid-
1950s and the mid-1960s, and a precipitous, widespread decline
between then and the late 1970s, before stabilizing in the early
1980s. The SATs taken by college-bound high school seniors
show
mathematical ability at 494 in 1952 and 502 in 1963; it dropped
as low as 492 in 1980 but by 2012 had reached 514. Verbal
ability
went from 476 in 1952 to 543 in 1966 and then dropped in 1980
to 502, where it remained stable for many years before dipping
to
496 in 2012 (College Board, 2012; see Table 8.1).
The scores made by students who participated in the ACT Pro-
gram between 1995 and 2010 reveal a similar pattern (Table
8.2). In
those years, reading and science scores were stable, English
showed
a slight increase, and math demonstrated a greater increase. The
overall composite rose to 21.1 in 2008 and remained there
through
2012. Declines in academic achievement during the 1970s and
subsequent stabilization were confirmed by the National Assess-
ment of Educational Progress (NAEP) studies of seventeen-
year-old
students. After bottoming out in the early 1980s, students’
perfor-

mance in math rose so that their average score in 2008 was
slightly
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Table 8.1. SAT Scores for College-Bound Seniors, 1975–2012
Year Critical Reading Mathematics Writing
1975 512 498 –
1980 502 492 –
1985 509 500 –
1990 500 501 –
1995 504 506 –
2000 505 514 –
2005 508 520 497∗
2010 500 515 491
2012 496 514 488
∗ Score from 2006, the first year of the writing portion.
Source: College Board, 2012.
Table 8.2. ACT Test Scores for High School Seniors, 1995–
2010
1995 2000 2005 2010
Composite 20.8 21.0 20.9 21.0
English 20.2 20.5 20.4 20.5
Math 20.2 20.7 20.7 21.0
Reading 21.3 21.4 21.3 21.3
Science 21.0 21.0 20.9 20.9
Source: NCES, Digest, 2011.

higher than in 1973. Over the same period, their scores in
reading
showed a gain in the 1980s but dropped back to the 1975 level
thereafter.
No one can say with assurance which social or educational con-
dition was primarily responsible for the decline in student
abilities
that apparently began in the mid-1960s and accelerated
throughout
the 1970s before leveling off. Suffice it to say that numerous
events
came together: the coming of age of the first generation reared
on
television; a breakdown in respect for authority and the
professions;
a pervasive attitude that the written word is not as important as
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it once was; the imposition of various other-than-academic
expec-
tations on the public schools; the increasing numbers of
students
whose native language is other than English; and a decline in
academic requirements and expectations at all levels of
schooling.
The time that the current generation has spent texting or on
social
media websites hasn’t helped either.
The effect of schooling and the availability of other educational
opportunities are suggested by the relationships between family
income and SAT scores. According to the College Board (2012),
scores made by the more than 1.6 million college bound seniors
who took the SAT showed a straight-line, positive correlation

with family income. Those with income greater than $100,000
averaged 540 in reading, 555 in math, and 533 in writing, while
those with income less than $20,000 scored 434 in reading, 460
in math, and 429 in writing. Since students from low-income
families are considerably more likely to attend community
colleges
than universities, these figures do much to explain patterns in
the
colleges’ student body.
School Requirements
Of all the listed conditions, academic requirements are the only
ones that are within the power of the schools to change directly.
Several premises underlie schooling—for example, that students
tend to learn what is taught, that the more time they spend on a
task
the more they learn, and that they will take the courses required
for completion of their programs. Hence, when expectations,
time
in school, and number of academic requirements are reduced,
student achievement, however measured, seems certain to drop
as
well. In its 1978 report, The Concern for Writing, the
Educational
Testing Service noted, “The nub of the matter is that writing is
a
complex skill mastered only through lengthy, arduous effort. It
is
a participatory endeavor, not a spectator sport. And most high
school students do not get enough practice to become competent
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writers” (p. 4). In the 1960s and 1970s, the schools put less
emphasis

on composition, and even in composition courses creative
expression
was treated at a higher level than were grammar and the other
tools of the writer’s trade.
Copperman (1978) recounted the depressing statistics regarding
deterioration of the secondary school curriculum. Specifically,
the percentage of ninth- through twelfth-grade students enrolled
in academic courses dropped between 1960 and 1972, from 95
to 71 percent in English courses and proportionately in social
studies, science, and mathematics. In other words, the average
high school graduate had taken four years of English in 1960
and
only three years in 1972. And the curriculum in English shifted
from sequential courses to electives chosen from courses in
creative
writing, journalism, public speaking, classical literature,
science
fiction, advanced folklore, composition, mass media, poetry,
and a
host of other options. Not only were students taking less
science,
math, English, and history, but in the academic classes they did
take the amount of work assigned and the standard to which it
was
held deteriorated as well.
During the 1980s, school reform shifted toward educational
excellence and outcomes assessment. In 1983, the National
Com-
mission on Excellence in Education published A Nation at Risk
(Gardner and others), in which it highlighted the importance of
education for the civic well-being of our nation. The report sug-
gested that states adopt a curriculum, known as the New Basics,
to
include four years of English; three years of mathematics,

science,
and social studies; one-half year of computer science; and two
years
of foreign language for students who wish to go to college.
Ravitch
noted that “by late 1983, a national survey found that forty-six
states had either raised their graduation requirements recently
or
were debating proposals to do so” (1985, p. 67).
A notable shift in high school course enrollments occurred.
Between 1982 and 2009, the average number of Carnegie cred-
its taken by high school students increased from 21.6 to 27.2
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Table 8.3. Average Number of Carnegie Units Earned by Public
High School Graduates in Various Subject Areas: 1982, 1994,
2000,
2009
1982 1994 2000 2009
Total Carnegie Units 21.58 24.17 26.15 27.15
English 3.93 4.29 4.26 4.37
Social Studies 3.16 3.55 3.89 4.19
Total Math 2.63 3.33 3.62 3.91
Total Science 2.20 3.04 3.20 3.47
Foreign Language 0.99 1.71 2.01 2.21
(see Table 8.3). All academic areas showed an increase, with
mathematics, sciences, and foreign languages showing the most
notable gains. In 2009, 70 percent of students took chemistry
com-

pared with 32 percent in 1982; 88 percent took geometry in
2009
versus 47 percent in 1982; 30 percent took biology, chemistry,
and
physics compared with 11 percent in 1982. Overall, the high
school
curriculum was rebuilt to the levels of the 1950s. The effect of
the
strengthened requirements was a reduced number of high school
occupational classes (bookkeeping, typing, shop) and an
increase
in the totality of courses taken by graduates.
In sum, students coming to the colleges in the 1990s and 2000s
had taken more academic courses, and their academic abilities
had
begun to climb. Indeed, high school seniors’ grade-point
averages
rose from an average of 2.68 in 1992 to 2.98 in 2005
(Landsberg,
2007). Student testing had increased as well, with more than
one-
third of the states requiring a minimum competency test for
high
school graduation. But as the SAT, ACT, and NAEP results
show,
overall gains in literacy have come slowly, if at all.
A recent report from Educational Testing Service reveals that,
despite all types of school reforms in the past generation, little
has changed. High school completion rates (exclusive of GEDs),
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77 percent in 1969, fell to 70 percent in 1995 and crept back up
to 75 percent in 2009, which has resulted in the United States

dropping behind all but five of twenty-six countries listed by
the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development.
Noteworthy here is that during that same period total spending
per pupil in public K–12 schools more than doubled in constant
2009–10 dollars, the student–teacher ratio (class size) dropped
by
half, and the percentage of teachers with at least a master’s
degree
doubled. One in four ACT-tested high school graduates of 2011
who took the core curriculum—four years of English and three
each of math, science, and social studies—met the ACT College
Readiness Benchmarks in all four subjects; 28 percent failed to
reach any of the benchmarks (ACT, 2011). Just over half the
graduates met the standard for reading, a decline from the peak
of
55 percent reached in 1999; only 45 percent met the benchmark
for math in 2011. The problem is even more acute in some
states:
ACT found that “more eighth and tenth graders are on track to
being ready for college-level reading than are actually ready
when
they graduate” and suggests that “state standards in high school
reading are insufficient—or nonexistent” (p. 3). More than half
of
the 49 states with reading standards fully define them “only
through
the eighth grade” (p. 3). And a recent report from the National
Center on Education and the Economy (2013) emphasized the
continued disconnect between demands in college-level English
and mathematics courses and high school requirements, both in
terms of subject matter content and faculty expectations of
students.
College Admissions
Because each college set its own standards and because the

founding of colleges preceded the development of a widespread
secondary school system, the early colleges displayed a wide
vari-
ety of admission requirements. By the late nineteenth century,
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most were operating their own remedial education programs. In
1895, 40 percent of entering students were drawn from prepara-
tory programs operated by the colleges and universities
themselves
(Rudolph, 1977, p. 158).
Numerous attempts to stabilize college admissions have been
made. In 1892, the National Education Association organized
the
Committee on Secondary School Studies, known as the
Committee
of Ten, which was to recommend and approve the secondary
school
curriculum for college matriculation. In 1900, the College
Entrance
Examination Board began offering a common examination for
college admission. Nonetheless, the wide variety in types and
quality of colleges in America made it impossible to devise
uniform
admission standards. There has never been a standard of
admission
to all colleges in the United States. The Educational Testing
Service and the ACT Program offer uniform examinations
across
the country, but each college is free to admit students regardless
of
where they place on those examinations.
Of all postsecondary educational structures in America, the

public community colleges bore the brunt of the poor
preparation
of students in the twentieth century. When sizable cohorts of
well-prepared students were clamoring for higher education, as
in
the 1950s and early 1960s, the community colleges received a
large
share of them. But when the college-age group declined and the
universities became more competitive for students, the
proportion
of academically well-prepared students going to community col-
leges shrank. Thus, the colleges were dealt a multiple blow:
relaxed
admission requirements and the availability of financial aid at
the
more prestigious universities; a severe decline in the scholastic
abilities of high school graduates; and a greater percentage of
appli-
cants who had taken fewer academic courses. And although the
recent upturn in the eighteen-year-old population has lowered
the median student age in community colleges, it has done little
to
elevate the students’ abilities.
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The community colleges responded by accommodating the
different types of students without turning anyone away. They
have always tended to let everyone in but have then attempted
to
guide students to programs that fit their aspirations and in
which
they have some chance to succeed. Students who qualified for
transfer programs were never a serious problem; they were
given
courses similar to those they would find in the lower division of

the four-year colleges and universities. Technical and
occupational
aspirants were not a problem either; vocational programs were
organized for them. Internal selectivity was the norm; failing
certain
prerequisites, applicants were barred from the health
professions
and technology programs. The students who wanted a course or
two
for their own personal interest found them both in the
departments
of continuing education and the transfer programs.
The rest, the poorly prepared high school pass-throughs, has
been the concern. How should the colleges deal with students
who
aspire to a college degree but who are reading at the fifth-grade
level? Shunting underprepared students to the trades programs
was
a favored ploy, giving rise to Clark’s cooling-out thesis (1960).
Another ploy was to offer a smattering of developmental
courses
where students would be prepared, more or less successfully, to
enter the transfer courses—or entertained until they drifted
away.
But the decline in achievement exhibited by secondary school
graduates and dropouts in the 1970s hit the colleges with full
force. The problem of the underprepared student became central
to instructional planning.
The Magnitude of Remediation
Remedial and developmental and, less often, compensatory and
basic
skills have been used more or less interchangeably for courses
designed to teach literacy (the essentials of reading, writing,

and
arithmetic) plus broader skills for living (time management,
how
to study, coping with family crises). Students have been advised
to
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enroll in those courses on the basis of entrance tests or prior
school
achievement. The courses are not often accepted for credit
toward
an academic degree, but their funding comes through the regular
academic instructional budget, sometimes augmented by special
state or federal program appropriations to assist disadvantaged
students.
Although the decline in student ability stabilized in the 1980s,
developmental education grew until it leveled off in the 1990s.
The rise in remedial course enrollment occurred because student
ability had sunk so low that college staff members, legislators,
and
the staff of the universities to which the students transfer had
had enough. The dropout and failure rates were unconscionably
high. When the population was expanding and an ever-
increasing
number of new students showed up each year, the problem was
not as acute, and few colleges did anything about coordinating
developmental education. In the late 1970s, however, the
attitude
shifted as the college staff realized that it was more feasible,
not
to say socially and educationally defensible, to keep the
students
enrolled than to let them drop out as a result of academic
failure.

All public two-year colleges offer developmental courses. The
Center for the Study of Community Colleges (CSCC) tallied
the sections offered in a national sample of colleges in 1998
and found that 29 percent of the scheduled class sections in
English and 32 percent in math were designated as
developmental
(Schuyler, 1999b). These data were corroborated in state
studies:
14 percent of the credit-course enrollment in Illinois, 17 percent
in
North Carolina, and 23 percent each in Florida and Washington
community colleges were in remedial courses (Illinois
Community
College Board, 2005; North Carolina Community College
System,
2007a, 2007b; Florida Department of Education, 2007;
Washington
State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, 2006).
Data on entering students who need remedial help suggest the
magnitude of the problem. The Education Commission of the
States
estimates that 40 percent of all college students and 58 percent
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of those in community colleges require some remediation
(Fulton,
2012). A 2010 study of 250,000 incoming students at fifty-
seven
community colleges across the country found that 59 percent
were
referred to developmental math and 33 percent to developmental
English or reading (Bailey, Jeong, and Cho, 2010). The
percentage

of underprepared entrants varies widely. A recent study of one
hundred thousand students in six community colleges that are
part of a large, urban system found that roughly 90 percent of
the students were assigned to remediation in one or more
subjects
(Scott-Clayton and Rodriguez, 2012). Of all the recent high
school
completers, 46 percent (and 92 percent of the GED graduates)
entering Kentucky’s public institutions in 2004 were
underprepared
for college (Kentucky Developmental Education Task Force,
2007).
In California, 72 percent of entering students required to take
the placement exam in fall 2010 were directed to basic skills
courses in English, and 85 percent were referred to
developmental
math. Strikingly, of those students testing into remedial math,
the largest percentage assessed at three levels below college-
level;
only 14 percent of these ever completed a college-level math
course (California Community Colleges, 2012). Over 70 percent
of students entering Virginia’s community colleges in 2007–08
were referred to developmental math (nearly half to three levels
below college-level math) and 34 percent to developmental
English
(Virginia Community Colleges, 2010). Nationwide, 44 percent
of
first-time community college students enroll in between one and
three developmental courses; 14 percent take more than three.
Developmental Teaching
How do college faculty members who face students daily feel
about
massive developmental education efforts and the poorly
prepared

students in their classes? Students’ abilities exert the single
most
powerful influence on the level, quality, type, and standard of
cur-
riculum and instruction offered in every program in every
school.
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Other influences—instructors’ tendencies, externally
administered
examinations and licensure requirements, the entry levels
imposed
by succeeding courses in the same and other institutions—are
of lesser importance. Nothing that is too distant from the stu-
dents’ comprehension can be taught successfully. All questions
of academic standards, college-level and remedial courses, text-
book readability and coverage, and course pacing and sequence
come to that.
Students are part of the instructors’ working conditions. Except
for faculty members recruited especially to staff developmental
programs, most feel that their environment would be improved
if their students were more able. In the CSCC’s 1977 National
Science Foundation–sponsored survey of science instructors at
two-year colleges throughout the country (Brawer and
Friedlander,
1979), respondents were asked, “What would it take to make
yours
a better course?” Over half noted “students better prepared to
handle course requirements,” a choice that far outranked all
others
in a list of sixteen (p. 32). More than twenty years later, Outcalt
(2002b) found almost the exact response among the academic
faculty he surveyed.

If students cannot be more able, at least they …
2
Students
Diverse Backgrounds and Purposes
Two words sum up the students: number and variety. To
collegeleaders, the spectacular growth in student population,
some-
times as much as 15 percent a year, has been the most
impressive
feature of community colleges. The numbers are notable: enroll-
ment increased from just over five hundred thousand in 1960 to
more than 2 million by 1970, 4 million by 1980, nearly 6
million
at the turn of the century, and over 7.5 million by 2010. During
the 1960s, much of the increase was due to the expanded
propor-
tion of eighteen- to twenty-four-year-olds in the population—
the
result of the World War II baby boom. More people were in the
col-
lege age cohort, and more of them were going to college. A
similar
phenomenon was apparent in the 2000s.
The top half of Table 2.1 shows the number of undergraduates
in all types of colleges relative to the number of eighteen- to
twenty-four-year-olds in the American population for each
decade
from 1900 to 1970. The table accurately depicts the proportion

of
the age group attending college for those years, but because
many
undergraduates—nearly half the community college population
currently—are older than twenty-five, the table must be
adjusted
to reflect what has been, since 1980, a more accurate depiction
of the rate of college going. Thus, the bottom half of the table
depicts the number of eighteen- to twenty-four-year-olds
enrolled
in college as a percentage of the college-age population; the
figure
equaled 41 percent in 2010. From the early 1960s through the
mid-
1980s, between 45 and 55 percent of high school graduates were
45
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Table 2.1. Undergraduate Enrollment in U.S. Colleges and
Universities Compared with Eighteen- to Twenty-Four-Year-Old
Population, 1900–2010
Year College-Age Undergraduate Percentage
Population Enrollment
(in thousands) (in thousands)
1900 10,357 232 2.2
1910 12,300 346 2.8
1920 12,830 582 4.5
1930 15,280 1,054 6.9
1940 16,458 1,389 8.4
1950 16,120 2,421 15.0
1960 15,677 2,876 18.3
1970 24,712 6,274 25.4
Year College-Age
Population
(in thousands)

Undergraduate
Enrollment of
18–24-Year-
Olds (in
thousands)
Percentage
1980 30,022 7,716 25.7
1990 26,961 8,628 32.0
2000 27,144 9,636 35.5
2010 29,312 12,077 41.2
Source: NCES, Digests, 1970, 2011; U.S. Bureau of the Census,
Current Popu-
lation Survey, 2010
entering some postsecondary school within a year of leaving
high
school. In 2000, that figure was 63 percent, and by 2010 it
neared
70 percent.
This chapter reports data on the numbers and types of students
attending community colleges and offers discussions of student
ability and academic preparedness, gender, race or ethnicity,
and
life circumstances. Other methods of classifying students and
their
intentions are examined, as are historic and contemporary
methods
for assessing and tracking them. The chapter provides
information

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Students 47
on enrollment patterns and reasons for the high incidence of
dropout, but information on student achievement in areas such
as transfer, degree or certificate attainment, and job getting are
presented in Chapter Fourteen, on outcomes. Unless otherwise
noted, data in this chapter derive from National Center for
Educa-
tion Statistics (NCES) reports published in 2011 and 2012.

Reasons for the Increase in Numbers
The increase in community college enrollments may be
attributed
to several conditions in addition to general population
expansion:
older students’ participation; financial aid; part-time
attendance;
the reclassification of institutions; the redefinition of students
and courses; and high attendance by women, minorities, and
less
academically prepared students. Community colleges also
recruited
students aggressively; to an institution that tries to offer
something
for everyone in the community, everyone is potentially a
student.
Demography has a profound effect on college enrollments.
The number of eighteen-year-olds in the American population
peaked in 1979, declined steadily throughout the 1980s, and was
23 percent lower in 1992, when it began increasing again.
Overall
enrollments in public two-year colleges doubled during the
1970s
and then slowed to a 15 percent increase in each of the
subsequent
two decades before accelerating to a 21 percent increase in the
first decade of the twenty-first century. This growth in a period
of
decline in the eighteen-year-old population reflects the
influence
of other factors on community college enrollments. However, it
pales in comparison with the surge of students entering in the
1970s.

To make up for the shortfall in potential younger students in
the 1980s, the colleges expanded programs that would be
attractive
to older students. Numbers of working adults seeking skills that
would enable them to change or upgrade their jobs or activities
to
satisfy their personal interests enrolled because they could
attend
part time, and many more registered after losing their jobs in
the recession. Older students swelled the roster. According to
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the American Association of Community and Junior Colleges
(AACJC, 1980), the mean age of students enrolled for credit in
1980 was twenty-seven, the median age was twenty-three, and
the
modal age was nineteen. A national survey conducted by the
Center
for the Study of Community Colleges found that by 1986 the
mean
had gone up to twenty-nine, the median had increased to
twenty-
five, and the mode had remained at nineteen. But the percentage
of students younger than age twenty-five has increased steadily
in
recent years, from 43 percent in 1995–96 to 53 percent in 2007–
08.
In the latter academic year, 30 percent were under age twenty.
Dual
enrollment, advanced placement, and similar collaborations with
high schools have led to a 7 percent population of students who
are
younger than age eighteen; in 2010–11, 10 percent of the full-
time
equivalent enrollment in Washington community colleges was
generated by dual-enrollment high school students (Washington
State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, 2011).
Today,
the national mean age is twenty-nine years, the median around
twenty-two, and the mode just under age nineteen.

Note the discrepancy among these three measures. The mean is
the most sensitive to extremes; hence, even a small number of
senior
citizens affects that measure dramatically. The median suggests
that
the students just out of high school and those in their early
twenties
who either delayed beginning college or entered community col-
leges after dropping out of other institutions accounted for half
the
student population. This 50 percent of the student body that was
composed of students aged seventeen to twenty-two was
matched
on the other side of the median by students ranging in age all
the
way out to their sixties and seventies. The mode reflects the
great-
est number; nineteen-year-olds continued as the dominant single
age group. Thus, a graph depicting the age of community
college
students would show a bulge at the low end of the scale, a peak
at
age nineteen, and a long tail reaching out toward the high end.
The availability of financial aid brought additional students
as state and federal payments, loans, and work-study grants rose
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Students 49
markedly. From the 1940s through the early 1970s, nearly all
types of aid were categorical, designed to assist particular
groups
of students. The largest group of beneficiaries was war
veterans; in
California in 1973, veterans made up more than 13 percent of
the
total enrollment. Compared with contemporary figures, this was
an astounding number; in 2007–08, veterans and military
service
members together made up only 4 percent of all undergraduates
(Radford and Wun, 2009). Students from economically
disadvan-
taged and minority groups were also large beneficiaries of

financial
aid; more than thirty thousand such students in Illinois received
state and local funds in 1974. Since the mid-1970s, more of the
funds have been unrestricted. Overall, 65 percent of full-time
students and 45 percent of the part-timers received some form
of
financial aid during the 2007–08 academic year. Total aid
averaged
$5, 650 per full-time aid-receiving student.
Part-time enrollment increased as the age of the students went
up. In the early 1970s, half of the students were full-timers; by
the
mid-1980s, only one-third were (see Table 2.2). Today full-
timers
constitute just over 40 percent of the student body, and these
Table 2.2. Part-Time Enrollment as a Percentage of Total
Enrollment in Public Two-Year Institutions of Higher
Education,
1970–2010
Year Total Fall Enrollment Part-Time Enrollment Percentage
(in thousands) (in thousands)
1970 2,195 1,066 49
1975 3,836 2,174 57
1980 4,329 2,733 63
1985 4,270 2,773 65
1990 4,997 3,280 66
1995 5,278 3,437 65
2000 5,697 3,697 65
2005 6,184 3,797 61
2010 7,218 4,266 59

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figures do not include noncredit students enrolled in community
or continuing education, dual enrollment courses, and short-
cycle
occupational studies. The pattern was consistent throughout the

country; in nearly all states with community college enrollments
greater than fifty thousand, part-time students far outnumbered
full-timers, sometimes by as much as three to one.
The rise in the number of part-time students can be attributed
to many factors: the opening of noncampus colleges that enroll
few
full-timers; an increase in the number of students combining
work
and study; and an increase in the number of reverse transfers,
people
who may already have baccalaureate and higher degrees; to
name
but a few. As examples of the latter group, over 48 percent of
the
92,594 graduates receiving bachelor’s degrees from the
University
of California and the California State University systems in
2001
took one or more classes at California community colleges in
the
ensuing three years. Nearly all were credit courses. The colleges
made deliberate efforts to attract part-timers by making it easy
for them to attend. Senior citizens’ institutes; weekend colleges;
courses offered at off-campus centers, in workplaces, and in
rented
and donated housing around the district; and countless other
stratagems have been employed. In 2011, 59 percent of student
credit hours earned at Arizona’s community colleges were in
courses
provided at alternative times and places or via alternative
delivery
methods (Arizona Community Colleges, 2012). Notable,
however,
is that even though the recent increase in younger students has
decreased the ratio of part-timers, it is still close to 60 percent:

64 percent in Illinois, 63 percent in Florida and Washington, 65
percent in Texas and North Carolina, and 87 percent in
California.
And nearly four of five of all students were employed, with 40
percent working full-time (Horn, Nevill, and Griffith, 2006).
The community colleges also play a role in educating students
from foreign countries. Fourteen percent of the more than
700,000
international students in U.S. higher education are in
community
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Students 51
colleges; Santa Monica College (California) and Houston Com-
munity College (Texas) each enrolls more international students
than any other public, two-year college in the nation, the latter
admitting more than all but five universities. Most international
students need to study English before attempting particular
college
programs. In the community colleges, even though they pay $6,
500
tuition on average, they find English as a Second Language
courses
offered at lower cost than in senior institutions and are less
likely to
have to qualify for admission. More than three-fourths of
interna-
tional students are between the ages of twenty and thirty-four;
most
are enrolled full time, often a qualification set by the conditions
of
their visas; and they stay enrolled for an average of more than
six
semesters (Hagedorn and Lee, 2005). The majority are from
Asia,
with China topping the list.
In addition to enrolling international students, community
colleges also enroll most of the postsecondary students residing
in the country illegally, primarily because the colleges cost far
less than other institutional types. Although twelve states allow
undocumented students who meet certain requirements (such as

attending high school in the state for a specified number of
years
and graduating or receiving a GED) to pay in-state tuition at
public colleges and universities, in most states these students
are
ineligible for federal and state financial aid. And because there
are only a scarce number of private scholarships available to
this
population, relatively few attend college. The Urban Institute
(Passell, 2003) estimates that only 5 to 10 percent of the
roughly
65,000 undocumented students who graduate from high school
each year do so. Nonetheless, community colleges—especially
those in states with large immigrant populations—already serve
a
fair number of undocumented students; California’s 112
colleges
alone enrolled 18,000 in 2005–06 (Gonzales, 2007). If the
federal
DREAM (Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors)
Act, which was first proposed in 2001 and has been
reintroduced
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several times since, is ever enacted, community colleges can
expect
further enrollment growth from this sector.
The growth in total enrollments did not result solely from the
colleges’ attracting students who might not otherwise have
partici-
pated in education beyond high school. Two other factors
played a
part: the different ways of classifying institutions; and a
redefinition
of the term student. Changes in the classification of colleges are
common. Private colleges become public; two-year colleges
become
four-year (and vice versa); and adult education centers enter the
category, especially as they begin awarding degrees. The
universe
of community colleges is especially fluid. From time to time,

entire
sets of institutions, such as trade and vocational schools and
adult
education centers, have been added to the list. As examples, in
the mid-1960s four vocational-technical schools became the
first
colleges in the University of Hawaii community college system,
and in the mid-1970s the community colleges in Iowa became
area schools responsible for adult education in their districts.
Indi-
ana’s Ivy Tech became a set of comprehensive colleges in 1999.
Sometimes institutional reclassification is made by an agency
that
gathers statistics; in the 1990s, the National Center for
Education
Statistics and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching began including accredited proprietary schools to their
community college databases, but data on those institutions are
listed separately. And in 2005, they both, along with the
American
Association of Community Colleges, removed the community
col-
leges that had begun offering bachelor’s degrees. All these
changes
modify the number of students tabulated each year.
Reclassification of students within colleges has had an even
greater effect on enrollment figures. As an example, when the
category defined adult was removed from the California system,
students of all ages could be counted as equivalents for funding
purposes. In most states, the trend has been toward including
college-sponsored events (whether or not such activities demand
evidence of learning attained) as courses and hence the people

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Students 53
attending them as students. The boundaries among the
categories
degree credit, non–degree credit, noncredit, and community
service are
permeable; student tallies shift about as courses are reclassified.
Furthermore, the community colleges have taken under their
aegis

numerous instructional programs formerly offered by public and
private agencies, including police and fire academies, hospitals,
banks, and religious centers. These practices swell the
enrollment
figures and blur the definition of student, making it possible for
community college leaders to point with pride to larger
enrollments
and to gain augmented funding when enrollments are used as the
basis for accounting. They also heighten imprecision in
counting
students and make it difficult to compare enrollments from one
year to another.
Nonetheless, the proportion of Americans attending college
increased steadily through the twentieth century, and the avail-
ability of community colleges contributed notably to this
growth. In
2010, 40 percent of all students beginning postsecondary
education
enrolled first in a two-year college. Of the students who delayed
entry until they were age thirty or older, 61 percent began in a
com-
munity college (NCES, 2012). As the following sections detail,
the
colleges have been essential especially to the educational
progress of
people with lower levels of academic preparedness, lower
incomes,
and other characteristics that had limited their opportunity for
postsecondary enrollment.
Students’ Lives
Unlike full-time students at residential, four-year universities,
whose lives may revolve around classes, peers, and social
events,

community college students often struggle to fit required
courses, tutoring, and other educational activities into schedules
constrained by part- or full-time jobs, family commitments,
child-rearing responsibilities, long commutes, or other
obligations.
These responsibilities complicate educational progress for even
the most committed students and are often cited as the primary
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reasons that community college students are less likely than
their
four-year counterparts to persist to a degree or certificate.
The U.S. Department of Education’s survey of students begin-
ning postsecondary education in 2003–04 (NCES, 2012)
illustrates
these challenges. One-quarter of community college students
had
one or more dependents; almost half of these were single
parents.
A full 12 percent claimed some sort of disability. Of students
cat-
egorized as dependent, 28 percent came from the lowest income
quartile, and 21 percent of all students reported incomes at or
below the poverty level. When students first enrolled, 45
percent
were working part time; another 33 percent held full-time jobs.
A
total of 12 percent spoke a primary language other than English.
And 45 percent were the first in their families to attend college.
The colleges have initiated numerous programs to assist
students
in overcoming these challenges. But the social and economic
realities that affect students’ ability to enter and succeed in
college
are not likely to disappear, and as long as the door remains open
to all who desire higher learning, community colleges will be
challenged to provide education and services in ways that better
fit
into their students’ lives.

Student Ability and Academic Preparedness
Classification of students by academic ability reveals a higher
proportion of lower-ability or less well-prepared students
among
community college entrants than among those matriculating at
four-year institutions. As Cross (1971) pointed out, three major
philosophies about who should go to college have dominated the
history of higher education in this country: the aristocratic,
suggest-
ing that white males from the upper socioeconomic classes
would
attend; the meritocratic, holding that college admission should
be
based on ability; and the egalitarian, which “means that
everyone
should have equality of access to educational opportunities,
regard-
less of socioeconomic background, race, sex, or ability” (p. 6).
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Students 55
By the time the community colleges were developed, most
young
people from the higher socioeconomic groups and most of the
high-
aptitude aspirants were already going to college. Cross
concluded,
“The majority of students entering open-door community
colleges
come from the lower half of the high school classes,
academically
and socioeconomically” (p. 7).
Various data sets reveal the lower academic skill level of the
entrants. The College Board’s Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT)
means for community colleges have been considerably lower
than the norm for all college students and—like the norm for
all students—has declined in recent years. In 2012 the average
national SAT composite score was 1226 (411 Critical Reading,
416 Mathematics, 399 Writing) for students who indicated an
asso-
ciate degree as their objective, whereas it was 1433 (477

Critical
Reading, 490 Mathematics, 466 Writing) for students with bach-
elor’s degree aspirations (College Board, 2012). Since the SAT
scores are highly correlated with annual family income
(Michaels,
2006), these norms reflect not only the college’s lower entrance
requirements but also the socioeconomic status of their
students.
Indeed, the socioeconomic status of dependent students
attending
two-year colleges tends to be lower than that of dependent
students
at four-year institutions: in 2003–04, 26 percent of community
col-
lege students but only 20 percent of four-year college students
came
from the lowest income level, defined as 125 percent of the
poverty
limit (Horn, Nevill, and Griffith, 2006).
Like most other institutions of higher education, the community
colleges have also sought out high-ability students and have
made
special benefits available to them. For example, in 1979,
Miami-
Dade Community College began giving full tuition waivers to
all
students graduating in the top 10 percent of their local high
school
class, and in 1991 it extended that offer to the top 20 percent.
Students in that group were eligible to apply for the Academic
Achievement Award, which provided $3, 200 to cover in-state
tuition and fees for two years. Those individuals graduating in
the

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top 5 percent received $5, 000 for two years, which essentially
covered not only tuition and fees but also textbook costs. The
Achievement Award program has since evolved into an Honors
College (Miami Dade College, 2012), but not before the idea
spread to other states. New Jersey’s NJ STARS (Student Tuition
Assistance Rewards Scholarship) program, created in 2004,

offers
scholarships to students in the top 15 percent of their high
school
class. These scholarships cover the full price of tuition for up to
five semesters at New Jersey’s nineteen community colleges as
long as the students maintain full-time enrollment in an
associate
degree program and a grade-point average (GPA) of at least 3.0.
In 2006 the program was expanded, making NJ STARS
recipients
who earn an associate degree with a GPA of 3.25 or higher and
meet the requirements for transfer eligible for the NJ STARS II
program, which provides tuition discounts of up to $7, 000 at all
of the state’s public four-year colleges or universities. In 2008–
09,
4,300 NJ STARS students were enrolled in the state’s
community
colleges and over 1,400 in four-year institutions, together
receiving
about $18 million in merit scholarships (Nespoli, 2010).
The growth of merit scholarships and honors programs evi-
dences the colleges’ welcoming the better-prepared students.
White
(1975) surveyed 225 colleges in the North-Central region and
found that about 10 percent had formalized honors programs.
Twenty years later, Peterson’s Guide to Two-Year Colleges,
1995
(1994) listed honors programs in over 25 percent of the institu-
tions, and in 2011 they existed in more than one-third
(Peterson’s
College Search, 2011). Outcalt and Kisker (2003) found that
over 9
percent of the faculty reported having taught at least one honors
course in the previous two years. Often, universities get
involved;

UCLA has assisted colleges throughout Southern California in
building honors programs and linking them with transfer oppor-
tunities (Kane, 2001). The students in honors programs often
receive priority registration, special academic advisors, and
tuition
discounts in addition to intensive courses. Montgomery College
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Students 57
(Maryland) has honors programs on each of its three campuses.
Its
Montgomery Scholars enrolls students directly from high school
and pays their tuition and fees for two years, including the cost
of a summer studying in England. More than 80 percent
graduate,
and most transfer. A Sophomore Business Honors Program is
open
to second-year students. Two additional programs are designed
for part-time, working adults at the …

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